The Original Thor's Hammer

We have grown so far away from our cultural roots that we often fail to see what would have been obvious to our ancestors. 

Two decades ago, before Freya was born, I planted a Birch Tree in the little garden in the centre of the city where I lived.  It was the Goddess Tree, the Tree on which the shamans of Siberia still build platforms in order to visit the other realms.  It is one of the original 'ladders to heaven'.  It never was strong enough to sustain a platform, nor steps of any kind, but it grew quite tall so that its branches reached to the second floor where there was a deck.  I decorated it with wind chimes and other offerings.  Last year, the Goddess Tree died.  It was a bad omen in a way, and it made it easier to move.

Throughout those years, the Birch showered the earth with her little seeds.  I always thought they were enchanting, and it is possible that I made the correlation with Thor's Hammer long ago and then forgot.

It was only today, when I found one on the counter of the bathroom in the new house, miles from the site of the dead Goddess Tree, that I immediately saw the shape of Thor's Hammer.  Look at the tiny seed in the centre of the photograph above.  Any one familiar with Viking talismans will see that it is precisely the shape of Thor's Hammer.  THIS is the original reason why ancients fashioned the charm from wood and metal and carried it with them.  No need to wonder why a Hammer ould have been shaped so oddly, more like a two-edged Battle Axe than any real Hammer.  It is the seed of the Birch, the Tree of Life, the Tree of Heaven for the ancient people of Northern Europe.  Even now, the White Birch is known as the 'Maiden' in some of the Northern lands.  A forest filled with those slender magical trees is utterly magical.